


Fresh Air

by Phoebsfan



Category: Alias (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-12-15
Updated: 2002-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:09:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24898210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phoebsfan/pseuds/Phoebsfan
Summary: Irina occupies her time in her glass cage.





	Fresh Air

It consumed her.

The burning inside, the one that renewed all of her past sins, so sharp it threatened her eyes with tears.

She remembered all to well the nights they'd lost themselves, over and over again. The way they had clicked.

In all the deception, with all the lies, there was one fact she could not ignore forever.

In a different world she could have been very happy with him.

Thoughts of what she could have had fill her mind. Memories flood her senses and occupy her time. The small glass cell keeps them from escaping. Locks them in with her until she chokes on the regret and the pain she caused.

Vows to keep Jack out of it, to forget what the naive younger version of herself foolishly felt, all but erased. But there was something about the new and older version of him that appealed to her later model as well.

It wasn't the memories of how well they fit together. Nor was it the way his form still stirred her with desire.

Jack was cold to her, calculating, trying his hardest to deny that that spark still existed between them. Irina knew that if anything, she deserved it and more. But it only served to increase her need for him. To prove herself worthy once more in his eyes.

All the reasoning in the world could not condone for her sins, this she knew. The foolish acts of her younger years had turned into her regrets and atoning for those acts would take more then a smile and talk of toasters. The younger version would have laughed at her foolish new goal. The new challenge she'd set before her.

To admit that part of her still clung to him. Still sought his familiar shape. Still yearned to break through the glass wall separating them and cling to him. A weak woman she was not. Understanding this increasing need to have him want her back, was something she could not begin to comprehend.

But she saw it in her daughter's eyes as well. The need for the one man who would forever remain unattainable. But to have tasted once that forbidden fruit added the determination to possibly achieve that unattainable man. Something her daughter lacked...she had never tasted that fruit.

Fifteen minutes of freedom, twice a week. The air outside was not thick with memories. It was the only thing that kept her sane. It was not the solitude that was eating at her soul. It was that thick, deafening air that screamed out the one word that could brought tears to her eyes when it fell from her daughter's, her own flesh and blood's, crimson lips. It was the look of pain and betrayal, etched on her husband's face.

The need for their forgiveness...

Yet how could they forgive her. After all that she'd done.

Sydney was young, much like her when first recruited. It scared her to see how her daughter threw herself into her work. Scared her even more with the ease at which her own flesh and blood would forgive her. Yet Sydney was steady. She had found out much earlier then her mother what kind of man she worked for. Sydney could be saved.

Jack was another matter all together. His bitterness would continue to eat him. And Irina could do nothing to repair the wound she'd left him with years earlier. No stories of how her heart broke with his. How her foolish idealism had ruined the best thing she would ever have. Because his love... she'd found nothing better in all her years since.

And so she sat in her glass prison. Choking on her own poison as it filled the air around her. Her own scrapbook of regret open once more.

The hope that one day he would trust her again was the only fresh air that sustained her.


End file.
